A storm in eastern Texas has taken down a 75-foot STL tower that serves four Townsquare Media FM stations.
The severe thunderstorm hit Smith County on Monday evening.
“During the height of the storm, there were wind gusts of 80 mph being recorded at Tyler Pounds Regional Airport on the west side of Tyler,” according to a post on the website of KTYL “Mix 93.1.”
“The winds made it to our studios on Brookside Drive near Loop 323 and South Broadway, and those strong winds destroyed our tower and it is now lying on the roof of our building.”
The 75-foot structure connected Townsquare’s studios to tower sites in Whitehouse, Overton and Kilgore via digital 950 MHz STL links.
Vice President of Engineering Martin Stabbert said the stations it served are KNUE(FM), KTYL-FM, KKTX-FM and KISX(FM).
The company has internet-based backups for all four stations. Three of them suffered little to no disruption, continuing to broadcast via those alternative STL paths. The fourth station, KISX, was off the air into midday Tuesday due to the loss of internet service at the transmitter site caused by the same storm, but then came back on.
Regional engineer Ed Dulaney and local engineer Chris Cobb are leading the response, with support from corporate.
“We have equipment, a tower crew and a roofing contractor on the way to the studio now,” Stabbert said on Tuesday. “We expect to have the tower removed and roof damage assessed by the end of today.”
